


come inside i've got some sweet things

by leocantus



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Age Difference, Blood and Gore, Horror Elements, M/M, Mind Manipulation, Murder, Other, Smut, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:33:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,967
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27306361
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leocantus/pseuds/leocantus
Summary: The door chimes open and Munehisa wordlessly points the model gun barrel in his hand in the direction of the stun guns before pushing the slide into place on top of it. There’s no shuffle across the store this time though, no clatter of the stun gun package hitting the counter. Instead, a shadow falls over the counter, though it takes a moment for Munehisa to notice. A shadow that, as he looks at it, roils and grows, jagged edges that split into one, two, three four five sixseveneightnin—Munehisa looks up.there's something strange in the neighbourhood.
Relationships: Amamiya Ren/Iwai Munehisa, Iwai Munehisa/Kurusu Akira, Iwai Munehisa/Persona 5 Protagonist
Comments: 17
Kudos: 62
Collections: Iwaipego Halloween Event 2020





	come inside i've got some sweet things

**Author's Note:**

> this was written for the iwaipego server halloween event. my very first time writing for an event and honestly, idk how people do this on a regs i just wanna sleep for a week.

The door chimes open but he doesn’t look up. It’s been doing that a lot lately— chiming, that is. Starting slow in the mornings and steadily increasing as the day goes on until sometimes he just props it open so he can get people in and out as quick as possible. For most people, business picking up would be a good thing. And it is good: most days he doesn’t even get the chance to restock his stun guns before they’re sold out again, and even his airsoft models are seeing more action than usual. But he’s used to dealing with military buffs and other gun enthusiasts, not a wide eyed and panicked public. To put it delicately, it’s starting to piss him off.

There’s a lot of fear in the air these days. People white-knuckling their purchases as they leave the store, standing hesitantly at the threshold as they gaze up at the grey days and encroaching nights. Like a kid thinking that if they don’t look under the bed the monster won’t get them. Tokyo’s about a stone’s throw away from putting up talismans to ward off evil.

So when the door chimes open and the murmur of conversation announces his customers, he doesn’t look up, not really. Doesn’t even call out a “Welcome,” not that he did much of that to begin with, since it’s not really that kind of store and Munehisa’s not that kind of storeowner. He just points with his screwdriver towards the stack of stun guns and then returns to the model in his hands. And like clockwork, there’s the shuffle of movement, and then the clatter of the packet on the counter. Munehisa finishes pinning two pieces together and sets it down to ring the stun gun up.

“That’ll be 2500 yen,” he says, words so worn in now he can’t help the boredom as he says them. His latest are some high school students: two blondes and a brunet, wearing the familiar red and black of the local high school — Shinketsu or Shuhei or something. He doesn’t usually get a lot of them, mostly because kids are hurrying home from school as soon as possible these days, either from their own fears or just absorbed from their parents. These kids look like they never got the memo, or maybe they just don’t know how to read it, because one blonde is standing idly by, twirling her hair around a finger while she waits. The other blonde, a delinquent — or at least, an attempt at one — is the one buying and his expression is as bored as Munehisa’s. And the brunet is just standing there, eyes hidden by the glare of his glasses, smiling like there’s a joke and only he’s in on it.

(There’s—)

(There’s something not quite—)

Munehisa ignores the other two and grabs the money thrust in his direction. He cashes them out, and then watches as their conversation picks up again, Munehisa already forgotten. They’re laughing about something, the delinquent swinging his new purchase carelessly as he gestures, with the other blonde draped over his shoulders giggling helplessly, and the brunet bringing up the rear with a low murmured something to set them off again; not a care in the world between them. 

When the door swings shut behind them, Munehisa checks the time and then gets up from behind the counter to flip the sign to ‘Closed’. It’s close enough to closing time that he’s decided that he’s done for the night. He flicks through the locks and then pulls down the shutters, does a cursory job at clearing up, and then grabs his jacket and heads home to Kaoru for the night.

Rush hour is still rush hour, even with the latest-news-bulletin most recent death — most recent _murder_ — which goes to show the enduring power of this country’s obsession with working. Munehisa scrolls through the story on his phone as he squeezes onto a Yamanote line train to Shinjuku. It’s gruesome stuff, just like all the others: a famous artist this time, found dead in his atelier with a mutilated face and nothing but bloody stumps for hands. Incidentally, they also discovered the massive forgery scam he was running and the young kids he’d been abusing the shit out of so there’s also a sense of poetic justice. Some enterprising young journalist had dug a little deeper and discovered that all the murder victims had been shitty people when they were alive — the sports teacher having been particularly bad — and so the media is having a field day with it. Now the public isn’t sure what to think, castigating the victims as well as the killer, condemning the police for being useless even as they beg for their protection. It’s as funny as it is sad. 

His phone vibrates with a new message, and Munehisa closes out of the news article before clicking on the notification. It’s Kaoru, because of course it is, checking in on him because that kid seems to forget which one of them is the parent. Munehisa starts typing out a quick reply and the train slows to a stop at Harajuku. There’s another renegotiation of space, crowds shifting like water eddies, as a deluge of people attempt to escape. Tucked in his corner, Munehisa doesn’t move, and looking the way he does not many people want to try moving around close to him. He may be ex-Yakuza, but neither the tattoos nor the attitude really go away.

Which is why it’s enough of a shock to feel someone jostle him that he actually looks up from his phone. It’s just a kid, messy hair sparking a vague familiarity in him, but then the kid looks up and like a lightning strike Munehisa suddenly, _vividly_ remembers him. 

There’s an echoing recognition lighting up the kid’s face, and then there’s that knowing smile again. Munehisa wonders if that’s the default or if it’s there specially for him. It’s inviting, but only in the same way a mouse trap is. Like those bright red berries that are poisonous to humans.

“Shopkeeper-san,” he greets quietly, turning around fully to face him. There’s still a thin barrier of space between them and the rest of the train, but this kid stands easily in the no man’s land, swaying with the movements of the train. He’s fallen in either through accident or by design, but remembering how carefree and care _less_ he was with his friends, he’s leaning towards the latter.

“You’re out late,” his mouth says without any input from his brain, murmured low in the oppressive silence of the carriage. He’s not one for small talk, no matter how awkward the silence gets, but there is something about this kid. “Shouldn’t you be in bed by now?” 

The train pulls into Yoyogi, and the rush hour crowd breaks and flows around them. They’re closer when it’s over, like a natural erosion of the space between them over time, but this kid’s smile tells him there’s nothing natural about it. Cute.

“I’ve got to go to work, shopkeeper-san,” the kid says, smile stretching wider. 

Munehisa raises an eyebrow. “Yeah? No one taking care of you?” 

It’s only after he’s said it that he realises how it sounds. There’s a sickly sweet scent to the kid that’s making his head spin a little and maybe that’s why his mouth is running away from him. Like this though, with only a scant handful of atoms between them, a hunger now in the curl of the kid’s mouth, Munehisa doesn’t get the feeling the kid minds so much.

“I’m very good at taking care of myself,” the kid says, the right levels of flirty and coy, but there are layers to it. Something immense shifts behind those eyes, like the silhouette of a great white passing through deep waters, and a prickling sensation goes down his spine. This is the kind of kid the clan would have fought to recruit.

Munehisa only hums an agreement though. “I bet you are.”

The train begins to slow as the announcement for Shinjuku sounds. Munehisa jerks his head towards the door as a question and the kid nods in answer so together they shuffle towards the doors once they open. He’s not expecting the hand curling around his arm, but somehow he’s not surprised. Munehisa sends him a look and gets one full of innocence in return, but he doesn’t dislodge the hand resting in the crook of his elbow even after they’ve made it off the train and up the stairs.

He hesitates as they’re about to part ways though, that soft squishy centre of his making itself known. “Hey,” he says, grabbing the kid’s attention, “if the job doesn’t work out then come by the store. Could do with someone like you working for me.”

He’s managed to shock him, which shouldn’t fill him with as much satisfaction as it does. Something shifts in the deep, dark waters of his gaze, but then the kid’s back to smiling and says, “I’ll bear that in mind.”

The door chimes open and Munehisa wordlessly points the model gun barrel in his hand in the direction of the stun guns before pushing the slide into place on top of it. There’s no shuffle across the store this time though, no clatter of the stun gun package hitting the counter. Instead, a shadow falls over the counter, though it takes a moment for Munehisa to notice. A shadow that, as he looks at it, roils and grows, jagged edges that split into one, two, three four five sixseveneightnin—

Munehisa looks up.

“Hi, shopkeeper-san,” the kid says, wearing that trickster smile again. Munehisa blinks hard, resisting the urge to reach up and rub his eyes. His temples throb, and Munehisa gives a discreet shake of his head, as though it’s possible to shake out whatever detritus that’s in there causing him to see things. 

In front of him, the kid stands patiently, thankfully not mentioning his lapse in concentration. The kid is still in his school uniform, red and black poking out from under the bundle of his winter coat. With him being all red-cheeked from the cold, it does the job of making him look startlingly young. Just a bit older than Kaoru, he thinks, and then immediately slaps a warning sign on that thought and pushes it away.

“Kid,” he manages finally, “you need something?”

“Were you serious about that job offer?” the kid asks, raising his eyebrows as though there’s a test he thinks Munehisa is about to fail. 

The kid’s body language is loose, unbothered, but Munehisa sets the model on down on the counter anyway, giving the kid his full attention. “Other job not working out for you?”

The kid gives a one shouldered shrug. “Expenses went up.”

Munehisa looks him over with a critical eye, but either he’s fine — for now at least — or he’s a very good actor. He has a feeling that right now it’s the former, but also that the latter is very, very true.

All he says though is, “You good to start now?”

The kid nods, and then with a cheeky smile he gives a small bow and says, “Please take care of me, shopkeeper-san.”

Munehisa makes sure to wait until the kid is looking at him to roll his eyes. “Call me Iwai, kid,” he says as he gets up and moves out from behind the counter. He’s got a small office in the back, for all the pain-in-the-ass paperwork that goes into owning and running a shop, and that’s where he heads now. He probably shouldn’t leave the front unattended, but the shop isn’t so big that he wouldn’t be able to hear the door.

“On the one hand,” the kid says as Munehisa ushers him into the room, “I should give you my name, but on the other I think I like being called ‘kid’.”

Munehisa gives into impulse and flicks him on the forehead. “Keep this up and I’ll downgrade you to ‘brat’ instead.”

The kid laughs, delighted. Munehisa sits down at the desk and, rather than sit in the spare chair, the kid shrugs off his coat and bag into it and then perches on the table next to him. “I’m Kurusu Akira, but I’ll let you call me whatever you want.”

Munehisa rolls his eyes again. “Cute,” he says, and it is, his heavy-handed flirting. Still, there’s something as appealing as there is endearing about it; Munehisa wonders if this is a reflex or if there’s a kernel of truth to it.

He outlines the pay, the hours, and what the actual job would be. He’s assuming that the kid — Kurusu-kun — doesn’t have permission from his school to work here, but the kid doesn’t offer anything and Munehisa doesn’t say anything so there’s plausible deniability all around.

The door chimes while he’s explaining all this so he sends Kurusu-kun into the stock room to unpack inventory and break down boxes while Munehisa deals with a fresh wave of customers. The first thing he’s going to do, he thinks to himself as he has to explain to the last set of wide eyes and wringing hands that they’re out of stun guns and to check back in two days, is to teach Kurusu-kun how to do this so he won’t have to deal with it any longer.

The door swings shut once more and Munehisa reaches for his half-finished model, checking the movement of the slide before reaching for the firing pin.

“I’m done, Iwai-san,” Kurusu-kun says from right beside him and Munehisa swears, whipping round and reaching for the weapon that he now longer carries.

“What the— you scared the shit out of me, kid.” Though that’s a bit of an understatement; Munehisa feels like years have been knocked off his life. It’s pretty hard to sneak up on him too — years of being in the Yakuza will do that to someone — but he didn’t sense a thing. No sound of footsteps, no brush of clothing, no whisper of a presence. Nothing. 

Kurusu-kun’s smile is very clearly amused this time. “Sorry, Iwai-san,” he says, the most insincere apology ever. 

“Yeah, I bet.” There’s something… animal in the tilt of Kurusu-kun’s head. Munehisa swallows hard, heart still pounding away in his chest, and then does his best to shake it off. “But since you’re out here, let me show you where everything is.”

And then — because even if he’s learned nothing else from raising Kaoru he at least knows this — he drops a hand on top of Kurusu-kun’s head and says, “Good job, kid.”

Kurusu-kun stops for a moment, looking up at him with those deep-dark eyes, and Munehisa counts it as a win.

Kurusu-kun was definitely a good choice, he thinks as the kid arrives in a blast of frigid air. They’re well into winter now, sun already set by the time Kurusu-kun arrives, and he can tell that it’s going to be a miserable one. There’s a heavy shroud blanketing the city, like the people’s fears given form to hang like a pall, blocking out the sun. Even in daylight it feels dark.

And with another gruesome murder, the body — if it could even still be called that — found just outside Shibuya station heralds another wave of panicked customers. With Kurusu-kun being such a quick study though, this means that Munehisa doesn’t have to deal with it. The kid is better with the customers anyway; Munehisa just doesn’t have the patience for it.

And it’s like that for a lot of things between them. It turns out they work well together, Kurusu-kun willing and able to pick up in a lot of the areas Munehisa left off. Didn’t even take the full three weeks Kurusu-kun had been working here for Munehisa to get used to having him in his space. In that time, Munehisa learns that Kurusu-kun really doesn’t like talking about himself, but if you’re paying enough attention you can pick some things up. Munehisa doesn’t know anything about his past or even much of his present, but he knows that Kurusu-kun has a sixth sense for danger, will do the impossible if it’s for his friends, and acts like he’s never met a decent adult in his life. 

He also knows that Kurusu-kun flirts unrelentingly and with everyone. Wields it as both sword and shield, a tool for getting whatever it is he wants from people, which should make it so much easier for Munehisa to just ignore it.

Except… Kurusu-kun is also: quick hands and an even quicker tongue. Heavy-lidded gazes, and a fearlessness that is absolute. It’s probably a combination of things that have Munehisa even considering it, but he’s decided that there’s gonna be at least one adult in Kurusu-kun’s life that’s not completely shitty and so he pushes those thoughts away.

Even when Kurusu-kun tucks himself against his side as they’re locking up for the evening, or scratches sharp nails through his hair and over the burr of his stubble, or—

“Wasn’t expecting you today, kid,” he says, forcibly changing tracks.

“Aren’t you lucky then?” Kurusu-kun says with a laugh, breezing through the shop to go and put his things in the office. 

Munehisa huffs a laugh and returns to his magazine, circling the models he wants as potential stock. He starts when a hand lands on his shoulder, because despite how many times he’s done it, Munehisa still can’t track Kurusu-kun through the store worth a damn and he still scares the shit out of him each time, and looks up into Kurusu-kun’s mischievous smile.

“So to what do I owe this pleasure?” Munehisa asks dryly, setting his magazine down. Kurusu-kun’s smile widens, seemingly basking in Munehisa’s full attention, and reaches up to scratch his nails through Munehisa’s hair. Munehisa fights the shiver that wants to tremble down his spine. 

“I remembered you had all those month end calculations to run through and figured I could watch the front for you.” Kurusu-kun tilts his head, still teasing sharp nails through his hair, looking at him again with that animal stillness. Whenever he does this, Munehisa can’t help but think, for a split second, that he’s being hunted before he shakes the ridiculous thought away.

“Alright,” he says, pushing up out of his chair. It dislodges Kurusu-kun’s hand, but then Kurusu-kun is looking up at him, eyes heavy-lidded, an expectant curl to his— 

(blood)

—cherry-red mouth. Munehisa inhales sharply… and then brushes by him, berating himself as he heads towards the back office to try and make his numbers work.

In no time at all he’s surrounded by scraps of paper with columns of scribbled numbers, and scraps of paper that he probably shouldn’t have scribbled on, the faint murmur of voices from the front of the store a somewhat soothing backdrop. Kaoru’s been offering — _threatening_ — to digitise the whole process for ages now and each time Munehisa has told him no, but right now, as he scrambles for the piece of paper with his bank balance on it, he’s definitely considering it.

The sound from the front rises above a faint murmur, and then sharply crescendos into a yell, and Munehisa is slamming through the door to his office before the sound even dies out, arriving in time to see a man towering over Kurusu-kun, clutching his own arm, and Kurusu-kun staring back at him with blood splattered all over his fingers.

Munehisa’s always had a temper. When you’re an angry kid, you end up growing into an angry adult where you’re constantly just a bomb waiting to go off. It was only once it had been left to him to take care of some defenceless kid that he managed to gain some kind of calm, learn some modicum of patience, and it’s always been hard won.

That calm goes up in flames, burnt away by a volcanic kind of anger. Two strides in and Munehisa swings, fist catching the man’s cheek with a satisfying crack. The impact on his fist feels good, and Munehisa pursues, swinging again, but a larger part of him just wants this piece of trash away from Kurusu-kun. He contents himself with two hits, and then shoves the man out of his shop and onto the streets, already forgotten once he shuts the door and locks it.

Munehisa takes a moment to breathe, knuckles throbbing, before turning back to Kurusu-kun. Kurusu-kun who is standing there, cold, alien eyes staring at the door, with his hand raised to his mouth, absent-mindedly sucking clean one bloodied finger after another.

“You okay, kid?” he asks. He only gets one step closer to Kurusu-kun before that gaze turns on him. Overhead, the light dims, and everything… stutters, like an old tape skipping, but when Munehisa blinks everything is fine once more. A dull ache starts up behind his eyes and he fights the urge to rub them. Kurusu-kun is looking at him that fathomless way he sometimes does — like he can’t quite believe Munehisa is real — and Munehisa quickly crosses the gap between them. He reaches for him as soon as he’s close enough, head throbbing in time to his heartbeat, and pushes him to sit on top of the counter, saying, “Where are you hurt?” 

Violence still simmers in his hands but they’re gentle when he tilts Kurusu-kun’s face up to check, gaze pausing, transfixed, at where each finger disappears into Kurusu-kun’s mouth before continuing down the column of his neck and the length of his body. 

“I’m fine, Iwai-san,” he says, removing his thumb from his mouth with a pop. “I wasn’t hurt.”

Munehisa nods

(Wait)

(Doesn’t that mean—)

relieved, and lets those words calm the frenetic thing inside his chest. There’s a smear of blood, just at the corner of Kurusu-kun’s mouth. Munehisa thumbs it away without even thinking about it and

(—pushes it past Kurusu-kun’s lips—)

(—sucks it into his own mouth—)

wipes it clean on his jeans. 

“What happened?”

Kurusu-kun gives that one-shouldered shrug and says, “I didn’t wanna sell him anything so he got angry with me.” And then, before Munehisa can interject with anything, tacks on, “I saw him around Yoyogi Park once, speaking with the kids there—”

Munehisa goes _cold_ , permafrost freezing him from the inside out, because—

“—and I knew that was near where Kaoru went to school. I didn’t want anything to happen to him.”

Munehisa puts a pin in that for later and slaps ‘urgent’ all over it, then drops a hand on Kurusu-kun’s head with a smile, ruffling it slightly as he says, “Good job, kid.” 

And then he stops, expression freezing. 

“Who told you about Kaoru?” he says, only just managing to keep it this side of polite. He doesn’t tell _anyone_ about Kaoru, because first of all it’s no one’s fucking business, but also he doesn’t ever want Kaoru getting caught up in any of his bullshit. Kaoru doesn’t come by the shop and Munehisa brings none of his shit around Kaoru’s school and his friends so that the kid can enjoy a normal life. So the fact that Kurusu-kun knows is… well, Munehisa’s doing his best not to jump to any conclusions, but it doesn’t look good.

Kurusu-kun freezes too, and then looks up at Munehisa with a strange look on his face. “You told me about him last week, remember Iwai-san?”

Munehisa’s frown deepens, because he _wouldn’t_ , but then, as if unearthed from mud, the memory of Akira seeing a message on his phone and Munehisa giving the explanation rises to the surface and he relaxes.

“Right, right, sorry,” he sighs, offering up an apologetic smile. “Forget it. I’m just. Concerned.”

“It’s okay,” Kurusu-kun says, patting him on the arm. Then he smiles his trickster smile and says, “Who wouldn’t want a big, strong man looking out for him?”

Munehisa barks out a laugh, tension draining from his shoulders. He gives Kurusu-kun another once over and then says, “Are you sure you’re okay, kid? Wanna head out early?”

“I’m okay.” Kurusu-kun curls his hands into Munehisa’s turtleneck and like this they look so small, so delicate, blunt nails picking at the material like an entreaty. “I have you, don’t I?”

“Yeah,” Munehisa says, and means every word of it. “Yeah you do.”

‘Later’ becomes ‘as soon as Munehisa thinks his contact might plausibly be awake’. Though he’s not clan, not anymore, he was smart enough to keep up with all of his contacts. Most of them aren’t clan either, so really they’re just a couple of friends meeting up for a beer. Munehisa meets up with Sasaki the next day on his lunch break at the burger place down the road and he asks about people operating out of Yoyogi. He wasn’t expecting much, but ends up hearing about someone named Kaneshiro, some nobody rising from nothing and thinking he can come here and take Shibuya. His thing is drugs and he’s preying on little kids to run it for him, and if Munehisa were still in the family, he probably would have taken him out without even needing to be asked.

Fortunately, none of that concerns Munehisa now; all he has to do is just take care of what’s his. That he’s more concerned by what some wannabe Yakuza can do to his family than he is of the serial killer set loose in Tokyo probably has something to say about him, but mostly it means that Munehisa doesn’t waste time on worrying about things he can’t do anything about. Better the devil you know and all that.

Kaoru’s a smart kid — way smarter than his dad, at any rate — so when Munehisa texts him on his way back to the store the kid takes it seriously. Munehisa doesn’t ban him from after-school activities or give him a curfew any earlier than the one he already has, because he wants his kid to be able to look back on his childhood and not completely resent the shitty excuse he got for a father, but he makes sure Kaoru knows what to look out for, and therefore what to stay away from.

Today is actually Kurusu-kun’s scheduled day to work, but Munehisa had told him last night that he didn’t need to come in. Still, he’s not even surprised when the door chimes open as the sky finishes fading to dark and in steps Kurusu-kun, thick scarf wrapped up tight around the bottom half of his face.

“I know I’m an old man,” Munehisa says dryly, “But I definitely remember giving you the day off today.”

“Did you?” he says airily, ducking into the back office to dump his things, “Must not have heard you properly. Sorry, Iwai-san.”

“I’ll bet,” he says, rolling his eyes. Looking at Kurusu-kun though, it seems like he’s handling what happened yesterday okay, which raises a _lot_ of questions but Munehisa will take it for what it is. “You wanna work in the back today?”

“Trying to keep me all to yourself?”

_Yes_. “I can see you’re definitely okay,” Munehisa says, tone as dry as anything as he shifts out from behind the counter for Kurusu-kun. 

He heads for the office, flicking Kurusu-kun on the forehead on the way past for being a brat, but then stops and sets his hand on his head to make sure he has his full attention. He’s noticed that Kurusu-kun is pretty touchy about being touched, but that he’s never minded when Munehisa has put his hands on him, will seek him out for it some days like he has a quota to fill.

“Hey,” Munehisa says, as Kurusu-kun shrinks the gap between them even more, comfortable in his space, “if that guy from yesterday comes back, call me _immediately_. He’s involved in some nasty shit and I don’t want you caught up in any of it, okay?”

Kurusu-kun twines his arms around Munehisa’s neck, smiling his trickster smile, and says, “Will you protect me, Iwai-san?” 

He’s so slender, so small, and Munehisa’s arm slips so easily around his waist as Kurusu-kun leans his weight into him. This close to him, the sickly sweet scent of him sends his head to spinning, and as Kurusu-kun peers up at him an image of them twined together like this sparks to being in his mind, Kurusu-kun caged in against the wall, his needle-sharp teeth tugging at Munehisa’s bottom lip until he tastes the metallic tang of his own blood and—

Munehisa inhales sharply, wrenching himself free. There’s something ravenous in Kurusu-kun’s gaze, in his smile, and when Munehisa exhales it shakes. “Call me if you need anything,” he says, grateful that his voice remains steady, and then he slips into his office and shuts the door behind him.

Thankfully it’s a quiet day. Munehisa pushes his thoughts — daydreams, _fantasies_ , and dangerous all the same — to one side and reaches for the first bit of paper spread out on his desk. Despite having already labelled Kurusu-kun off-limits, his mind continues to circle the idea, like water down a drain, and he’s getting tugged under, drowning in these thoughts. 

His knuckles are still sore. Munehisa hasn’t punched anyone in a long time but there’s something about Akira that makes it so easy for him to—

Munehisa takes a deep breath and pushes away the phantom press of his body, the phantom touch of his mouth, and gets to work.

When Munehisa resurfaces it’s closing time and his month end reconciliations have finally been completed. Stepping out of his office feels like waking up, the level or disorientation exactly the same, so he’s glad to see that Kurusu-kun has already finished closing up and all Munehisa needs to do is grab his things and go.

It’s beyond cold when they step outside. Kurusu-kun winds Munehisa’s arm around himself as they lock up, their breath coalescing in the air in front of them, and Munehisa tries his best not to freeze at the touch, to pull away, to not think about razor-sharp teeth and bloody mouths. Neither of them have said anything about earlier, Munehisa because he’s a coward, but Kurusu-kun can be inscrutable even at the best of times. Is this all just a game to him? A test? 

Maybe, he thinks, scrubbing his free hand over his face, he’s just tired. Whatever’s happening, his weird thoughts are his own problem that he needs to deal with. Munehisa stifles a sigh and doesn’t pull away, and together they walk down the alleyway back to central street.

As is becoming the norm, the streets are deserted, Shibuya more or less a ghost town. Nothing but flickering lights and the wail of the wind down the street. Apart from some patrolling officers and criminals skulking in the dark, most everyone has already completed their journey home. Under the neon lights of central street, Kurusu-kun’s eyes seem to glow, luminous like the moon up above. Munehisa tucks Kurusu-kun’s scarf a bit more snugly around his neck and says, “Be careful going home, alright?” 

This is where they usually part ways, Munehisa turning to walk back to his apartment and Kurusu-kun to travel back to wherever the hell it is he calls home. He turns to step away, but Kurusu-kun doesn’t let go, grip surprisingly strong for such a small kid. “You should walk me to the station, Iwai-san,” he says, eyes wide in the kind of innocent look Munehisa knows not to trust.

But it’s not a bad idea; Munehisa doesn’t trust that guy not to come looking for some payback, and Kurusu-kun so rarely asks him for anything. In the end, there was only ever one possible answer, so he agrees and they head off to the station, still tethered together.

“You got far to go to get home?” he asks as they reach the scramble. He doesn’t ask for specifics, because it hasn’t ever worked in the past, but if Kurusu-kun is living all the way out in Omiya or something, Munehisa will walk him right up to his front door if he has to.

Kurusu-kun pats his chest through his coat as though meaning to comfort _him_ and says, “Don’t worry, Iwai-san, it’s not far at all.” 

They draw to a stop at one of the staircases leading down into the station. Munehisa is acutely aware that, wrapped around each other like this, they look like a couple sharing a loving goodbye at the station. It would be so easy to just lean down and— but instead Munehisa pulls them apart, feeling the rush of cold air in his place.

“Alright. I’ll see you on Saturday then.” 

Kurusu-kun gives him a little wave, and then calls back over his shoulder as he descends the steps, “Don’t miss me too much.”

“Brat,” he says, far too fondly.

He watches as Kurusu-kun makes his way down the stairs and into the station, and as he steps into the bright lights of Shibuya station, his shadow stretches long behind him, boiling and bursting and splitting into—

Pain spikes in his head. Munehisa squeezes his eyes shut for a moment, and then turns and makes his way home.

That night, Munehisa dreams.

He steps out of his office and into the eerie stillness of his shop, and in the middle of it lies a body bloated with death. A slab of meat in a growing pool of red, stomach torn open, viscera spilling everywhere, and Kurusu-kun standing unmoving over it, even as blood laps at his feet. He glances over at Munehisa as he draws closer, blood up to his elbows and even more smeared around his mouth, glistening in the low light.

“You okay, kid?” Munehisa asks, close enough now to push him to sit on top of the counter. “Where are you hurt?”

Kurusu-kun smiles at him sweetly, a gaping wound full of sharp sharp teeth, and says, “I’m fine, Iwai-san, I wasn’t hurt. See?”

He holds out his hand and Munehisa is relieved as he takes it, blood still warm and fresh. He brings the hand up to his mouth and—

Wakes up.

Munehisa _gags_ , like the thick, warm mess of blood is still coating his throat, and scrambles out of bed and towards his bathroom. His heart pounds, about to burst out of his chest, and Munehisa fumbles for the light switch, fully expecting his hands to be covered in the sticky remains of another person’s blood, before staggering to the sink, stomach heaving.

They’re clean, he thinks, but he turns the tap on and washes them anyway, and then gulps down handfuls of cool water. He stops, panting, and lets his head hang low between his shoulders for a moment. Why would he dream that? That’s not what— there was no blood, everything was fine so why is he— why did he…? Munehisa was in the Yakuza for a very long time. He’s been both enforcer and cleaner, so some dead body is nothing to him. But.

(needle sharp teeth and dark, dark blood and a wide, gaping wound for a smile)

(the warm rich taste of blood on his lips on his tongue in his mouth)

Munehisa is full of broken thoughts.

Exhaustion hits him like a lead weight. Munehisa stumbles back to his room, body heavy even as his mind circles, and shuts the door and flicks the light on. He grabs a book from his bedside table, and then gets in bed and sits upright against the wall. He doesn’t want to sleep again tonight, doesn’t want to know what else his mind has to show him, but between one sentence and the next he’s gone, sinking back down into the realm of sleep.

The light of the day doesn’t see him any better. He starts awake at the slam of the bathroom door, as exhausted as when he passed out in the first place. If he had dreams again he doesn’t know them, and he’s pathetically grateful for that. He gets up to cook breakfast for Kaoru, and only manages lacklustre answers to the flow of conversation as they eat. When Kaoru leaves for school, Munehisa paces the apartment like a caged animal and then, tired of his own thoughts sickening him like an infected wound, throws on some clothes and slams his way out.

The cold crisp air feels good on his face. Munehisa picks a direction and starts walking, an aimless stroll around the neighbourhood or something. What he should be doing is heading off to work right now, but the idea of sitting slow and lazy for the day isn’t settling right with him right now. It gives him too much time to think, which is the last possible thing he wants today. 

It’s an obsession, he thinks, though he couldn’t answer why if you paid him. Somewhere along the way some switch got flipped in his head, and now Munehisa is dangerously hung up on some kid. And if it’s an obsession, then maybe he just needs to get it out of his system. Maybe, if you spend too much time thinking about things you can’t have, you get fucked up dreams instead, and the only way out is to purge it.

And Munehisa knows places. Knew them, really, since it’s been a while, but that shouldn’t be a problem. Discreet places where he can go and lose himself in another person’s body, and when he’s done he’ll be as good a new.

Munehisa rolls his shoulders, tension loosening. It’s never sat right with him, to sit around and talk it out when he could be out there doing something about it, so it feels good, knowing his next step. He finishes out his walk, picking up some ramen to bring back for lunch, and then heads back to his apartment.

He texts Kaoru to tell him that he’ll be home late and then silences his phone. Despite the years, the route is familiar to him, almost muscle memory, from stepping off the metro at Shinjuku to pushing open the doors of his destination. Even before he had a kid to be home for, he wasn’t ever one for relationships anyway. Just quick and easy, no strings attached.

The one he picks tonight is young, that nebulous age of ‘younger than Munehisa’, not that that’s hard, but old enough to drink. Dark hair and wide eyes and Munehisa doesn’t let himself think about why that is. A generous mouth that opens up eagerly and takes his cock real nice. Munehisa snarls his hand in his hair and makes good use of it, deep thrusts until he can hear him choke a little, until his face is a mess of spit and precome, and then he pushes the kid face down on the bed and fucks him until he cries, fingers digging in as he begs for more.

And when Munehisa goes home that night, it’s with the knowledge that whatever it is he tried to do, it has completely and irrevocably failed.

(That night he dreams again. The shop, the body, and Kurusu-kun smiling at him so sweetly as Munehisa leans down and licks the blood clean from his lips.)

He doesn’t go to work the next day either. 

He rolls out of bed when Kaoru stumbles into the bathroom, and gets started on their breakfast. Their whole morning routine is mostly a result of trial and error, with Munehisa being the error part, but it helps that Kaoru is such an easygoing kid. God knows where he gets that from, but then again people always say that kids are the best parts of their parents.

Munehisa is exhausted again (still) but Kaoru seems content with the quiet this morning, scrolling idly through his phone as he eats his breakfast.

“Oh,” he says suddenly, and Munehisa looks up from where his head had been sinking lower and lower into his bowl of rice. “More dead bodies found around Shibuya.” 

“Huh?” Munehisa says, very intelligently, and Kaoru slides his phone across the table to Munehisa for him to read himself.

Dead bodies is right. It’s a fucking massacre, from Yoyogi Park right down to the scramble and the police are still finding bodies. They’re attributing it to the serial killer though it’s not like anyone can say for sure. They were mauled, torn apart as though attacked by a wild animal, one of them with a belly bloated until it burst, spilling guts and 100 yen pieces everywhere. He reads the name Kaneshiro Junya and it takes his tired mind a second to place it but… huh. Guess he tangled with someone he shouldn’t have. Either way, problem solved, apparently.

Munehisa skims through the rest article while across from him Kaoru scoops out the rest of his rice into his open mouth, mumbles a quiet, “Thanks for the meal,” and then darts around the apartment getting ready. He slips his phone out of Munehisa’s hand on his way to the door, stooping to grab his bag and step into his shoes before hurrying out with a loud, “Bye, dad,” before slamming the door behind him. 

The quiet of the apartment expands. Munehisa releases a long sigh, rubbing at his eyes, and then picks up his chopsticks once more. He only manages another couple of mouthfuls of rice before he gives up and covers up the rest of his food to maybe eat later. 

He needs to get out of his apartment. Sitting with his thoughts is going to drive him crazy faster than his dreams will. He remembers to text Kurusu-kun and tell him not to come in today, and for a long moment he briefly considers telling him not to come in ever again, but he’s a coward there like he is in everything else and can’t bring himself to hit send on that message.

His exhaustion catches up with him though. Munehisa sits down on the sofa for a second and is fast asleep in the next breath. The sound of the door buzzer startles him awake some time later and for a long moment, Munehisa doesn’t know where he is. But like an image coming into focus, the ceiling of his apartment becomes familiar once more as he stares. He still feels like shit though, and for a second he thinks about going back to sleep, but like they’re reading his mind, the buzzer goes again and Munehisa heaves himself to his feet, annoyed. 

They don’t get a lot of visitors here so Munehisa peers out of the window down at the street to see who’s bothering him. It’s an overcast day, the grey sky washing the colour out of everything, so it’s easy to spot the head of dark hair, the red winter coat and scarf as protection from the cold, and the way Kurusu-kun is staring straight up at his window, eyes locked on his.

Munehisa curses.

He briefly entertains the thought of just ignoring him, but it’s half-hearted at best; Kurusu-kun is more stubborn than he is and Munehisa would fold in the end, like he always does. He hits the button to let him into the building, and then unlocks his front door and waits. Even in the echoing hallways of his building, Kurusu-kun still doesn’t make a sound; looking at him, Munehisa sometimes wonders if he’s even real.

“Iwai-san,” Kurusu-kun greets cheerfully as he crests the top of the staircase and catches sight of him. Munehisa waves him into his apartment and shuts the door firmly behind him, waiting until Kurusu-kun has removed his boots in the genkan before leading him through to the living room.

“Sorry for bothering you,” Kurusu-kun says, making no move to take off his coat or sit down. There’s something off about him today, gaze tracking Munehisa like a snake about to bite, and Munehisa’s protective nature very quickly overpowers everything else.

“What is it? Are you hurt?” he says, reaching for Kurusu-kun and pointedly tugging at his coat until Kurusu-kun unzips it himself and shrugs out of it. Munehisa slings it on the back of the sofa carelessly, not willing to leave Kurusu-kun alone long enough to put the coat away properly while he’s acting this strange.

“No, Iwai-san, I’m fine,” he says, but he stands patiently by as Munehisa checks him over anyway.

“Okay,” he says, exhaling heavily, “okay. Shit, kid, sit down—” and here, he takes his own advice, dropping back onto the sofa himself “—and you can tell me what the hell you’re skipping school for. How’d you even get my address anyway?”

Kurusu-kun sits next to him, twisted to face him, elbow against the back of the sofa to prop up his head. He looks at home here like this in Munehisa’s apartment, like he belongs here. The way he’s leaning into the sofa is indolent, relaxed, even as he frowns at Munehisa and says, “You gave it to me, Iwai-san, remember? Back—” 

And then the memory surfaces and Munehisa sighs — fuck, he’s just all over the place right now — and says, “Yeah, at the beginning, just in case. You’re right.”

They’re touching, he realises suddenly, Kurusu-kun’s leg pressed to his thigh, and then his fingers skim across his chest, curl around his neck, until Munehisa snaps out a hand and stops him. Right now, on the back of those dreams, and the weird, obsessive thoughts plaguing him, he _can’t_ — he needs this to not be happening. There’s something greedy about Kurusu-kun’s gaze, about his growing smile

(What sharp teeth you have—)

and that spells trouble for Munehisa.

“You worried me, Iwai-san, when you texted me this morning,” Kurusu-kun says, distance between them shrinking by infinitesimal amounts. The overly sweet scent of him hits and Munehisa’s thoughts fuzz, head lolling back against the sofa for a second. God he’s tired. Far too tired to keep up with these games right now. If this is a test then he’s about to fail it.

“I’m fine, Kurusu-kun,” he says, pushing him back firmly for some much needed space. “You should probably go.” And then he decides that it’s still not enough and goes to get to his feet, but Kurusu-kun’s hand snaps close around his wrist like jaws slamming shut, nails scoring sharp lines of pain down his arm, and _tugs_. Munehisa falls back onto the sofa and Kurusu-kun swings a leg over his lap, movements sinuous and graceful.

“But I want to be here with you, Iwai-san,” he says, and Munehisa’s senses see nothing but him. “Don’t you want me here?”

He’s so close now, fingers teasing out little shivers of sensation down his spine, the whisper of his mouth over Munehisa’s, and Munehisa… well, Munehisa is only human. Cupping the back of Kurusu-kun’s head, he tugs him in for a kiss, and Kurusu-kun makes a soft triumphant noise and then just falls into it, mouth opening easily under the slightest of pressure. He tastes 

(cold, dead, like the sharp tang of—) 

sweet, like he’s been eating dessert, and Munehisa sucks the taste from his tongue, chases it on his lips, voracious. He cinches his arm around his waist, body growing hot as they press together, in his lap where he should be, legs around his waist. Kurusu-kun nips at his lips, teasing, and Munehisa devours him, fingers snarled in his hair to hold him in place.

They part, breathe, and then Munehisa tugs him back in again, head spinning as he takes and takes and _takes_ , a starved man at a banquet, and Kurusu-kun offers it up so sweetly.

“Is this what you wanted?” he asks, voice low, on the edge of a growl, tugging Kurusu-kun’s head to the side so he can get at his throat. There’s a faint voice at the back of his head telling him to stop, but it’s drowned out by the rest of him that wants to see Kurusu-kun on his knees, on his back, face down on his bed.

Kurusu-kun jerks at the touch of teeth and his nails bite into Munehisa’s shoulders. “More,” he says, with a breathless laugh. “Give me more, Iwai-san, I want everything from you.”

Munehisa groans and hooks his hands under Kurusu-kun’s thighs, carrying him off the sofa and towards his bedroom. Akira wraps his arms around his neck as he wraps his legs around his waist, mouth teasing his, tongue teasing the seam. It’s dim in the apartment, weak afternoon light barely making it through the window, but the glint of it off Akira’s glasses make his eyes seem to glow, and as Munehisa gives in and presses Akira into the wall for another kiss, he feels sharp nails prick along the nape of his neck.

Munehisa rises slowly to consciousness, a heavy languidity in his body that makes waking up feel like trying to swim against the current. It’s dark when he blinks his eyes open, with only the glare of the streetlamp outside to illuminate his room, and Munehisa stares uncomprehendingly at the ceiling before the rush of memories from earlier sweep through. He rolls over, and then starts with a curse when he sees Kurusu-kun lying still next to him, head propped up on his hand, gaze pinned to Munehisa.

“Fuck,” he says emphatically, and Kurusu-kun cracks the same smile he always does when he manages to scare the shit out of Munehisa. He’s miles of pale skin and dark bruises right now, and Munehisa feels an answering hunger as he remembers how he put them there. The corner of his duvet has thrown over Kurusu-kun’s feet, but the rest of him is gloriously bare and Munehisa was a fool to think that one hit would get this out of his system. If this is an obsession then he’s only made it worse. Munehisa lets himself drop back onto the bed and sighs, rubbing his eyes.

“I know that face,” Kurusu-kun says.

“Do you now,” Munehisa says flatly.

“Mmm,” Kurusu-kun says, ignoring all warning signs like he usually does. “You’re thinking of running away again.”

Munehisa snorts, derisive, but he doesn’t refute it, not when he knows it’s true. What he settles on in the end is, “I don’t know what you want from me.”

Kurusu-kun moves then, sliding on top of Munehisa and slotting his legs between Munehisa’s own. The weight of him is nothing but Munehisa is pinned in place, unable to even think of moving. 

“What if I just want you?” Kurusu-kun says, gazing down at him with heavy-lidded eyes. His voice is a mere whisper of breath across his mouth, like he’s sharing a secret; Munehisa’s arms come up to cradle him, wrapped around his waist. “I like you, Iwai-san. Think I’m going to keep you.”

In the space between heartbeats, all of Munehisa’s half-hearted defences crumble.

“Call me Munehisa,” he says, a surrender, and Kurusu-kun smiles.

“Well,” Kurusu-kun says, and then closes the distance for another kiss. “I already told you that you can call me whatever you want.”

“Brat,” Munehisa says with a smile, and then he pulls him down into another kiss.

He wonders idly if they can go again. The idea that Kurusu-kun— that _Akira_ is still open and wet from his come has him biting into the kiss, has him rolling Akira onto his back so he can press him down into the bed, settle between his thighs. Munehisa slips two fingers back inside him with a loud, wet sound and the soft noise Akira looses into his mouth sends heat through him in a flashfire. 

Hands land on his shoulders as Akira’s head falls back, nails biting in, and Munehisa sucks fresh marks along his offered throat. His back already aches from where Akira clawed him last time but he wants him to scratch new lines there.

He wonders if that was Akira’s first time.

Something dark shifts inside him, reeking of possession, obsession, and Munehisa bites down, fingers twisting inside him, just to hear Akira cry out.

“You should mark me some more, Munehisa,” Akira says, breathless, rocking himself on Munehisa’s fingers and Munehisa curses into his skin.

His phone vibrates on the table, shockingly loud, and Munehisa’s unconscious thought of _it’s probably Kaoru_ brings reality crashing back in.

“Fuck,” Munehisa says, panic rising to subsume everything else. 

Akira groans as Munehisa pulls away and snatches up his phone, quickly checking the time and then the message, and then again as Munehisa says, “Yeah, yeah, I know, but you need to shower and then get dressed. I’m sorry,” he adds, knowing that what he’s asking isn’t anything anyone would want to hear, “but my son’s gonna be here soon and I can’t— not yet.”

Akira pouts at him but it’s playful enough and he slides from the bed with no argument. Munehisa breathes a silent sigh of relief and reaches for him before he gets too far, giving him a soft kiss as thanks. He’s not running, that’s not what this is, but he wants to do this right and that means doing right by Kaoru too.

Akira stretches as he stands, in the shaft of neon yellow light shining in from outside, and the shadows around him seem to stretch a little too. Munehisa shakes away the faint pressure in his head and leads Akira to the bathroom.

Not much changes, in the end. The push and pull of their relationship continues on, work as seamless as it’s always been. Munehisa had been expecting some kind of upheaval, but the fact that their relationship now looks a lot like it did before suggests that Munehisa is just a fucking idiot.

For the things that _are_ different… well, Munehisa has no complaints there either, not when Akira seems so eager to drop to his knees at every opportunity; not when Munehisa can just push Akira up against the wall when the itch under his skin boils over and he just can’t keep his hands to himself. There’s something a little wild about the way they fuck; Akira loves goading him until he snaps, whispering filthy things in his ears, always begging for more. And Munehisa leaves his share of marks, ownership branded into Akira’s skin, but Akira does too: bite marks on his throat, his chest, his thighs, and scratches like claw marks up and down his back.

He’s still having those dreams though. He doesn’t see them often, but when he does they’re the same: vivid scenes of blood and guts and in the middle of it all, Akira, smiling sweetly at him with a bloody slash for a smile, and it’s all starting to get tangled in his head. Munehisa goes to sleep after having etched himself into Akira’s skin, sating that all consuming urge he has to just take, and then finds himself tearing into fresh corpses to feed into Akira’s open mouth, or sucking the still-warm blood from Akira’s hands, his chin, his mouth, and it’s not real, he _knows_ it’s not, but he wakes so exhausted afterwards that all his realities are starting to merge.

And so those dreams that had him up in the middle of the night, dry-heaving into his bathroom sink, suddenly aren’t so—

Well anyway, he already knew he was fucked up.

He’s… well he doesn’t know happiness, wouldn’t be able to recognise it, but things are good between him and Akira. He’s even seen his tattoos, and hasn’t said anything or asked anything or even hinted that he’s wondered about it. But there’s also the creeping sensation of a trap closing in around him, of time running out. Maybe he’s just fracturing in slow motion. He hopes that when Akira eventually moves on he doesn’t just break.

Munehisa looks up when the office door clicks open and Akira steps in. He doesn’t say anything, not immediately, just comes around the side of the desk and leans down for a kiss, and then another, and then he eventually just slides into Munehisa’s lap for the third, fourth, and fifth.

Munehisa hums into the last one and then says, “Yeah, yeah, what have you done?”

“Nothing yet,” Akira says, cradling Munehisa’s face in his hands. His tongue flashes out, the barest touch to Munehisa’s bottom lip, and then he leans back out of reach as Munehisa chases him. “But if you let me go early I’m sure me and my friends could think of something.”

“Cute,” Munehisa says, sliding a slow hand down Akira’s back, and back up again, under his top. Part of the reason why he has such a hard time keeping his hands to himself is to do with how responsive Akira is to him, and he feels the slow rise in temperature between them as Akira inhales sharply and arches into his touch.

“So cute that you’ll let me g—”

Munehisa laughs, slipping his hand back out again. “Alright, alright, go on. Go.”

He gets another kiss for that, a long, lingering one that leaves him wanting, leaves him with the desire to lick his lips just to savour it, and then Akira slides back out of his lap to grab his bag and coat. Munehisa grabs the stock order forms he’s been working on and follows Akira out of the office and into the shop.

They've multiplied since the last time they were here, Akira’s group of friends. There are the two blonds again — Sakamoto and Takamaki he now knows — plus their newest members, Kitagawa and Nijima.

The two blonds are bickering loudly in the corner, Nijima loudly trying to get them to stop, and Kitagawa is… posing with his gun models in the corner. Naturally. It’s dark out, which doesn’t mean much this time of year, but it’s also ticking over into late. And it must be exhausting for people to live constantly with this level of fear, but every so often there’s a new body found all gutted and mutilated, as though to remind the city that it’s still not safe. Which means that most all good boys and girls are hurrying straight home from school, but not these kids. And that’s not even the weirdest thing about them; it's no surprise that they've gathered around Akira. Munehisa wonders what that says about him.

“Akira!” Takamaki shouts, breaking off mid-sentence from whatever squabble she was having. She starts forward, and then her expression falls as she seems to spot Munehisa. “No good?”

Akira holds up his things and she immediately cheers, reaching for him and tugging him towards the door as she calls, “Thank you, shopkeeper-san,” over her shoulder.

Munehisa waves them all off and takes his seat behind the counter as the door swings shut behind them. It leaves the shop feeling bigger without Akira here, which is ridiculous because it’s a tiny little hole in the wall place anyway, but it’s mostly because it’s hard to remember what it was like before he had Akira in his life. He’d been feeling, well, maybe not lonely because he had Kaoru, but he also didn’t have much anyone else either. It’s kind of pathetic that his life consists of just his son and the schoolkid working for him, but it’s not like he has any kind of illusions about himself.

He continues filling in the order forms— though between Akira and Kaoru, apparently that’s next on the digitalisation chopping block. Maybe it’s about time he introduces them to each other. Maybe not as the kid he’s been fucking, but as a worker in his shop should be fine, right? Not for the first time, Munehisa wishes he had some kind of back up when it came to this parenting thing because like fuck he knows what he’s doing.

The door chimes open, and without looking up he points with his pen towards the display of stun guns. There’s the expected shuffle of movement, but the footsteps make their way across the shop towards the counter instead so after a moment he looks up and—

“Tsuda. It’s been a while.”

An understatement. He and Tsuda were sworn brothers in the Hashiba, but though he left on good terms, the moment he left the clan Munehisa pretty much stopped existing to him. He still has a soft spot for Tsuda about a mile wide, but he doesn’t expect anything from him, not anymore.

“Iwai,” he returns, smiling, sounding truly happy to see him. “Still working in your little shop, I see. How’s retirement?”

Munehisa pauses for a moment, because the words sounded kind of— but then he says, “Same old, same old. Can’t really complain. What can I do for you, Tsuda?”

“I’m here to buy some guns, of course.” He’s still smiling, like they’re sitting in an izakaya somewhere, drinking good beer and laughing at all he dumb stuff their _kyodai_ get up to, like no time has passed at all and they’re picking up where they left off. It’s nice, but Munehisa can’t help but wait for the other shoe to drop. Why else would he be here out of the blue after years of silence? “Do you have any Black Stars models? Type 51s or Model 213s will also do.”

“Sure, I think we’ve got at least one of those kicking around in stock somewhere. I’ll show you.”

He slides out from behind the counter and leads Tsuda to where the models are usually shelved. There’s two out of three there, which isn’t bad, so he pulls down the Black Star and the Type 51 display models for him to look at. He doesn’t talk about its features, because Tsuda likely already knows them, just hands them over for him to see, and Tsuda’s expression lights up as he sees them, turning them over in his hands, checking the grip, the slide, the barrel, before handing them back.

“Very nice,” Tsuda says as they head towards the counter again, “your store is as impressive as always. Great stuff, Iwai.”

Munehisa can’t help but smile a little; that actually sounded sincere. “Thanks, Tsuda. Appreciate it.”

“I bet you could start a war with realistic models like these,” he says, still smiling that same smile. “Seriously, these are incredible. I should get going now though but I’ll take both of them. I’ll need an entire arsenal,” he jokes, in a way that’s very much not a joke. “How long would that take?”

“Depends on whether I have the parts or not,” he says with a shrug. “If I have to order them then it depends on how quick the parts come in. Some stuff will probably have to go through customs which is completely out of my control,” he adds, because Tsuda strikes him as the kind of customer to get bitchy about that.

“And to customise them?”

_Ah_ , Munehisa thinks, _there it is_. “Don’t do that anymore, Tsuda. That’s what being in retirement is about.”

Tsuda pauses for a second, and then the smile drops. “Tell me, Mune… What’s your son’s name again? Kaoru-kun, was it?”

Munehisa never really understood the phrase ‘seeing red’ until now. He’s an angry person, but that just means that he burns up bright and fast before the blaze of his anger dies down again. But this is not that. Blinding rage whips through his body like a hurricane, so angry he could breathe fire with it, a force of destruction. But he says nothing. He doesn’t move, he barely even breathes. He spoke to Kaoru this morning, saw him off to school, but if Tsuda has— if he’s done _anything_ to him—

“Well then,” Tsuda says, satisfied, “if you don’t deliver by the end of the month then I might just have to get Kaoru-kun involved. I wonder how he’ll react.” Here he tilts his head, as though actually concerned. “I guess if things go sour we could always try selling him again.”

The relief of knowing Kaoru is safe for now is subsumed by the rising wave of violence inside Munehisa. He thinks about punching Tsuda. About hauling back and slamming his fist into Tsuda’s smug face. About grabbing something heavy and hitting him with it again, and again, until he stops moving. But he knows that won’t help, that it doesn’t guarantee his son’s safety.

In the end, all he says — all he _can_ say — is, “Fine.”

“Well then!” he says, that familiar smile returning, “I look forward to hearing from you again soon.” He turns and walks out the door, and Munehisa feels like screaming.

Generally speaking, Akira spends a lot of time watching him.

Before, he figured it was wariness mixed in with the desire to figure him out. Now, it’s likely a mixture of things, including the fact that for Akira, looking is a precursor to touching, and he likes to do a whole lot of that now that they are whatever the hell it is they are.

But the looking this time feels like waiting. Not that Munehisa thinks he’s being particularly subtle about the fact that something is wrong but… he doesn’t want the kid getting involved with this shit either.

Because the thing is, there’s no lesser of two evils here: either he does the customisations and Kaoru has not just a shitty dad but a shitty Yakuza dad, or he doesn’t and Kaoru is dragged into this shit show.

The second one is out of the question, which means that he’s got to do the fucking customisations, but Munehisa can see where both paths lead: Kaoru saddled with a shitty reputation because his father’s Yakuza. Kaoru, an angry kid who grows up to be an angry adult with no other options in life but to join a family somewhere, and that is beyond unacceptable.

So option one is also out, which means that Munehisa somehow has to figure out another way. And that has a very high chance of someone ending up dead.

Munehisa finishes shelving the rest of the parts and then flattens down the last couple of boxes. Akira’s been watching him for the last maybe-five minutes, but since he hasn’t said anything Munehisa has just let him be. When the last box is broken down Munehisa gets up, dusting off his jeans, and that’s when Akira finally moves.

“Done?” he asks, as if Akira hasn’t just been standing there. He lets Akira step into his arms, and his hands land on his hips like they’re magnetised there.

Akira hums his answer, looking up at Munehisa as he slides his hands up his chest and that definitely is a look that has nothing to do with waiting.

“Want something?” he asks, mouth ticking up in the corner.

Akira hums again, pushing up on his toes until their mouths are a hair’s breadth apart. The scent of him spins his head, dizzyingly sweet, and Munehisa’s hands slip lower, over his ass.

“Hungry?” he says, teasing.

Akira nips at his lip. “Mmm, I could just eat you up.”

A shiver works its way through him and Munehisa swallows. “Yeah?”

“I’d start here,” Akira says, ghosting his fingers across Munehisa’s mouth, “and then here,” he says, fingers sliding over his jaw, “and then…” His fingers trail down Munehisa’s throat, and fuck, Munehisa can _see_ it, a vivid flash of them together, of Akira sitting on his cock, thighs shaking as he pulls himself off and sits back down with a moan. His sharp nails have left furrows in Munehisa’s body, and blood pools in the dip of his collarbone and the divots of his pecs and abs. And as Akira shakes through another thrust Munehisa drags his fingers through the mess and pushes two fingers into Akira’s waiting mouth—

There’s a thud as Akira’s back hits the wall, and then Munehisa is pushing into a kiss, a vicious biting greedy thing. His hands slip down to Akira’s thighs, and he jumps as Munehisa lifts, and suddenly he’s back between his thighs where he belongs, biting kisses into his mouth. For one long second he’s sure he’s dreaming, that Akira’s mouth will split open in a sweet smile, that he’ll cut himself on razor-sharp teeth, that he’ll look down and there’ll be a dead body ready for the taking and it’ll be fine that he’s so turned on he can barely think straight because it’s not real, it’s just a dream. But the weird things don’t happen, and he doesn’t wake up, and fuck, he’s so— he’s so fucked up, he’s so so wrong.

It’s like getting doused in cold water. Munehisa breaks away from the next kiss, head turned to the side while he just breathes and pulls himself back together. Akira is watching him again when he looks back, something… predatory in his hooded gaze, but when Munehisa steps back he lets himself slide to the ground easily.

“Go grab our stuff,” he says, bending to collect the flattened boxes, “I’ll meet you outside.”

If he’s hoping for Akira to stick around for a while, he’s doing a pretty shitty job of making it happen. Munehisa runs a rough hand over his face, and then drags the cardboard out the back entrance and dumps it in the bins there, shivering as the wind cuts right through him. When he turns around, Akira is standing there, and Munehisa slams his elbow into the wall as he jerks in surprise and swears.

Well. Akira can’t be too mad at him if he’s laughing at him like this. Munehisa swats him, and then quickly shrugs into his coat, fur lining warming him quickly. Akira presses himself to his side in his own form of forgiveness, Munehisa’s arm pulled around him, and together they walk towards the main road and then down towards the station.

“So,” he begins, willing to ignore his problems for at least a little bit longer, “You ever gonna tell me why you and your friends got banned from karaoke?”

Akira’s whole body shakes under his arm with his laughter. “But I already told you why, Munehisa.”

“A bit more detail would be nice, because usually when I say ‘there was a difference of opinion’ it means I ended up putting someone through a table.”

Akira just hums and Munehisa laughs. “People are gonna start saying I’m a bad influence on you.”

“Well,” Akira says, slowing them to a stop so he can wind his arms around Munehisa’s waist, mould himself to his chest. “The next time I do something bad, I’ll let you punish me.”

“Brat,” he says, and kisses him. The air is cold but Akira’s mouth is molten, and Munehisa feeds from it for a long time, Akira wrapped up in the circle of his arms.

“Hey,” he says after the kisses taper off and they’re just breathing together, the only two people in the world, “You wanna come out for dinner with me and Kaoru some time?”

Akira smiles and Munehisa regrets the offer immediately. “That’s such a great idea, Munehisa—”

“No.”

“—because we’re practically the same age—”

“ _No_.”

“—so we could hang out together—”

“Stop.”

“—and play video games—”

“Fuck, I take it back,” he says, hand in Akira’s face to shove him away and Akira goes, laughing himself breathless as he twists out of reach.

“Bye, Mune-oji-chan,” Akira says, dancing away as Munehisa swipes at him and towards the staircase down to the station, “I’ll see you on Thursday.”

“Brat,” Munehisa says again, and then turns to walk home.

Munehisa finishes locking up and then, shoving his cold hands into his pockets, makes his way over to where they’re meeting up for dinner. He’s closing up early today, though it definitely doesn’t feel like it. Most days it seems like the only light he gets is from abandoned storefronts and streetlamps, but with how much of his life he spent operating at night, winter always feels kind of nostalgic to him.

His phone vibrates in his pocket, and Munehisa checks it even though he knows it’s just Kaoru checking he’s on his way. To say that Kaoru was excited when Munehisa asked him about dinner with a friend from work is probably the biggest understatement of the year, and with Akira being Akira he can already tell that this is gonna be a disaster. Then again, Kaoru is pretty fucking weird too, so maybe it’s only Munehisa who will be in a hell of his own making.

But with the whole Tsuda situation, Munehisa’s got to make sure that he’s got all his bases covered. And that means that if something… happens when he meets up with Tsuda later that week then he wants to make sure that Kaoru knows Akira. Just in case. Sasaki had dug up more than enough for Munehisa to ‘third option’ his way out, but he won’t relax until the whole thing is over.

His phone goes again, and it’s Akira this time when he checks it. Munehisa clicks on the notification and it’s… a picture, Akira and Kaoru squashed into the frame together and grinning at the camera, Akira holding two fingers up in a peace sign, and Munehisa, filled with an unnamed sense of dread, picks up the pace.

In the end they’d decided on yakiniku and fortunately there’s a good one right here in Shibuya, so it doesn’t take Munehisa long to get there. They’re already seated by the time he does so Munehisa ducks in behind the server and follows her to where they’re seated, unsurprised to find them already deep in conversation.

“Guess I don’t need to do introductions then,” he says as he takes off his coat and slides into his seat next to Kaoru and across from Akira. 

He gets a chorus of ‘hi’s from the both of them, and then just as he finishes folding his coat over the back of his chair, Kaoru says, “Dad, why didn’t you tell me I was meeting your boyfriend today?” and Munehisa _chokes_.

“ _What_?” he says, looking down at Kaoru in dismay. He opens his mouth again — damage control, denial, _something_ — but it’s like his mind is stuck, endlessly skipping over the word ‘boyfriend’. 

“Well,” Kaoru begins, tone matter of fact, “it was obvious you were seeing someone, but I figured I’d let you introduce them when you were ready.”

“ _What_?” he says again.

“But I don’t think you were going to tell me at all,” Kaoru says, and here he actually sounds a bit hurt.

Munehisa sighs, suddenly really tired. “You met him and you can’t think of _one_ reason why I might be keeping it a secret?”

Kaoru looks like he’s about to let it go, but then one glance at Akira — and Munehisa glances too, wondering what he’s seeing in Akira’s opaque expression — seems to give him the courage to say, “How will you know how I feel about things if you won’t talk to me about them?” and that’s… shit.

Going into this, Munehisa wasn’t expecting to get lectured by his own kid in front of his— whatever the hell Akira is, in the middle of the restaurant, but he’s beginning to think he should have.

“Alright,” he says after a long pause, “alright. You’re right, I’m sorry.” 

The waitress arrives at that point to take their order, and so they have to scramble for their menus and figure out what the hell they’re eating. Munehisa orders a beer as well because he fucking well deserves one, and when the waitress wanders off again he drops a hand on Kaoru’s head, mussing his hair. 

“Are we good?” he asks, and the line of his shoulders eases as Kaoru nods.

The rest of the meal is surprisingly not awkward. Kaoru and Akira take turns making fun of him so he assumes they’re having a good time, and it’s nice to see them getting along so well even if it makes Munehisa think of things he’d really rather not.

He grabs the bill when they’re done, and then joins them back outside in the cold. Munehisa stuffs his hands in his pockets and says, “I know I’m gonna regret asking this, but how exactly did you come to the conclusion that me and Akira were…”

“Dating? Kurusu-kun’s not a very good actor,” Kaoru says, like that’s not the biggest crock of bullshit ever.

“Sorry, Munehisa,” Akira adds, not sounding very sorry, and Munehisa turns a glare on him. There’s an edge to his smile, a challenge, and Munehisa is abruptly reminded of Akira saying _The next time I do something bad, I’ll let you punish me_.

Akira’s smile grows, and Munehisa has to forcibly turn his mind from it before he embarrasses himself in front of his son. When he looks back at Kaoru, he’s looking between him and Akira with an amused expression on his face.

“Do I need to leave you two alone?” Kaoru asks.

“Yes,” Akira says before Munehisa can even open his mouth, and Kaoru grins at the both of them.

“Okay,” he says, far too cheerfully, “I’m off to the cinema. Be back in a couple of hours.” He darts in for a quick hug, and then pulls up his hood and disappears up the road with a wave.

“You,” he says, dropping his arm over Akira’s shoulders, “are in so much trouble.”

“Mmm,” Akira says, sounding so pleased with himself. “Are you going to punish me, Munehisa?”

“It’s not really a punishment if you’re looking forward to it,” he says but Akira’s words reverberate in his head. The problem is that Akira makes everything sound good, wants things so bad that Munehisa wants them too.

“Want me to beg?” Akira says, as they start walking, stepping out from the circle of light cast by the restaurant and into the dark streets, heading towards Munehisa’s apartment. Akira’s breathing hitches a little, and it sounds like when Munehisa bites marks in his thighs, like when he pushes Akira down and his dick sinks in the first inch. “No, Munehisa,” he mocks, in a way that doesn’t sound like mocking at all, and Munehisa bites his lip, his grip around him tightening. “I’m sorry, I promise I’ll be good.

“Or maybe you’d prefer something else,” he says, still speaking, as they turn right down a road and the muted life of the main road falls away. “Yes, Munehisa, please. Harder. Make me _feel_ it.”

The street is abandoned, quiet, but none of that registers to Munehisa as he shoves Akira back into a wall with a snarl, and Akira is laughing when Munehisa fists a hand in his hair to yank him into a kiss. It’s always like this, Akira playing him so neatly, plucking and pulling at him until Munehisa is all twisted up inside. Caught up in a current, just pulled along by the tide. No control, but then again, the thing about Akira is that he makes him want to lose it.

Munehisa can hardly feel the shape of him through their coats, but that doesn’t stop him from pressing them together, encouraging the arch of Akira’s body into his. Frost hangs in the air around them, but between them the temperature builds, panting out hot breaths between biting kisses. And in between kisses Akira taunts him some more, whispers all the ways in which Munehisa could punish him, body pliant under his hands, mouth soft and open.

He’s not quite sure how they make it back. He gets distracted again one road over, and then once more just at the front door of his building. Akira bites his bottom lip as he waits for him to open his apartment door, and they lose time as Munehisa sucks that lip into his mouth, bites it for himself. In the genkan now it’s Akira who wants. Who tugs him free from his coat so he can get to the body underneath, who climbs up his body and gets carried through to his bedroom.

Munehisa drops him to the bed and strips him out of the rest of his clothes, fighting out of his own between kisses until there are no more barriers and Munehisa has nothing but bare skin under his hands. 

He thinks about marking it, about darkening it with bruises, and Akira stretches out under his gaze, on display, and smiles his trickster smile. “Whatever’s putting that look in your eyes, let’s do that. I’m all yours to use.”

The words are like gasoline on a bonfire, and Munehisa was right to be worried, because he knows bone-deep that he will never let this kid go. Akira’s stretched out beneath him, arms above his head, so Munehisa clamps them down at the wrist with one hand and then takes the kiss he wants, enjoying the way Akira strains at his grip.

“What was it you said?” he says between kisses, voice rough. “Here,” and he tugs at Akira’s swollen bottom lip with his teeth before licking into his mouth. “And then here,” he says, smearing the words into his skin as he sucks and bites at his jaw, worrying a mark into being. “And then…” He ghosts his mouth along the length of Akira’s neck until he meets the junction with his shoulder, and then bites down hard, teeth sinking in. Akira moans, high and breathless, tugging uselessly at his arms, and Munehisa kisses him again, feeling drunk, feeling like a train out of control.

“I’m gonna ruin you,” he says, the words like jagged bits of glass, “I’m gonna—”

Akira bites the rest of the words off with another kiss, legs rising to hook over his hips. “Punish me,” he breathes against his mouth, straining his body up against Munehisa’s. Their hips roll together and Munehisa thinks that he needs to be inside Akira _now_. “I want your hands on me, Munehisa. Make me feel it. Put me in my place.”

“Stop talking,” he grinds out, so hot, so turned on he feels the lick of flames on his breath when he exhales.

“Make me,” Akira says, and Munehisa’s hand bites into skin like a reprimand as they fall into another kiss. His mouth feels bruised when he pulls back, but Akira doesn’t look much better. His eyes are hooded, smile a little wild, and in the wash of colour coming in from the streetlamp outside, Munehisa sees the livid mark in full bloom on his neck.

“Roll over,” he says, reaching over to fumble the lube out of his bedside table. When he returns, Akira has rolled over onto his knees, thighs spread, head down and pillowed on his hands. 

Munehisa’s stomach twists sharply at the view, at the deep arch of his back, ass as unmarked as the rest of him and on display, and before he even realises it his hand is caressing the curve of it, Akira’s words echoing in his head.

“Do it,” Akira says, and Munehisa lifts his hand and then brings it down hard, first on one cheek, and then on the other. The impact sounds loud in the room, feels good reverberating up his arm, and the soft, hurt sound Akira makes leaves him _aching_.

Munehisa does it again, and again, and Akira jerks, soft sounds rising to soft cries, but he doesn’t squirm, doesn’t move away, just submits himself to it and something takes a hold of Munehisa. He _likes_ this, he realises, the power he holds over Akira, who seems too wild to be broken in by anyone. But here he is, body trembling under Munehisa’s hand.

“Can you come like this?” he asks, smoothing a hand over his ass. His voice sounds like it’s coming from far away.

Akira gives a breathless laugh. “Make me,” he says again, and Munehisa feels like he’s very quickly approaching some edge, critical mass.

There’s another sharp crack as he brings his hand down again. And then again, and again, falling into a rhythm. Akira’s hands tear at the sheets as he’s reduced to nothing but harsh pants and short cries, and Munehisa locks away each and every time Akira demands it harder. 

In the end it doesn’t take much: Munehisa brings his hand down one more time, and Akira curses and comes, body locked taut. Munehisa feels his self control snap like an elastic band past its limit. In seconds he’s slicked up his fingers and has teased two fingers into Akira’s hole, free hand on his back to hold him in place. He fucks his fingers in and out roughly, and Akira pants and groans into his hand, cursing when Munehisa shoves in a third.

“ _This_ is where you belong,” he says, pulling his fingers out. Beneath him, at his mercy, waiting for his cock— either of them, _all_ of them are true. Munehisa slicks up his own cock, feeling like he’s been hard for years, and kneels up behind Akira. Holding it with one hand, he lines up and pushes in past the rim, groan rattling in his chest as he sinks in. Akira makes this desperate, wounded sound, ass undoubtedly sore, but his body just opens up around Munehisa and he bottoms out easily.

“Look at how easily you take me,” he says, reaching down to grip Akira by the back of his neck with one hand while the other settles at his hip. Akira grips at the sheets and hitches his hips back, meeting Munehisa as he thrusts forward and Munehisa loses himself in the shiver of heat that works through him.

It’s a blur after that. Words trip from his tongue, and Akira must answer in kind, but Munehisa focuses on the heat and pressure, the slick, wet slide of his dick. The hand he slips down to circle around Akira’s dick and the rising urgency in Akira’s voice. The heat boiling up inside him, and then the bite marks he leaves all over the back of Akira’s neck as he comes.

“So,” Akira says once they’re no longer panting, still damp with sweat. His body is half draped over Munehisa’s, chin resting on his hand. In the dark like this, his eyes are fathomless, two black holes devoid of all light, impact only cushioned by the soft shape of his mouth. “Are you finally going to tell me what’s wrong?” He’s watching him, like he always is, but it looks as though he’s not waiting anymore.

Still, Munehisa hesitates, hating the idea of bringing him into it. There are so many things about him that add up to ‘Yakuza’ and even if Akira never says anything, he’s not stupid, by any definition of the word. But it’s one thing to suspect and it’s another to have it confirmed to your face. In the end though gives in. If he wants to ask Akira to look out for his kid just in case— just in case, then he should probably know why. 

So he explains the whole Tsuda situation, trailing his hand along Akira’s spine in a way that’s almost meditative: the threat, what he found out, what the plan is.

“So I need you to do a favour for me,” he says, tying off the story. Akira has been quiet throughout, watchful, still, and the weight of his stare is like a physical touch. If Munehisa were anyone else he might say that he felt nervous. “If something happens, will you look out for Kaoru for me?”

Akira’s eyes narrow. “How about you let me come with you instead?”

Munehisa’s entire body revolts at the suggestion, at the idea of Akira being anywhere near to that piece of shit Tsuda, but then he looks at Akira, at his expression, at the look in his eyes, and all his objections fade away. He gives in. “Alright,” he says with a sigh. “Alright.”

Akira pushes himself up Munehisa’s body for a kiss, something possessive in the way Akira holds him, something wild in the kiss, and Munehisa can’t help but answer it.

When they pull back Akira’s mouth is bitten flush. Munehisa wants it around his cock.

“What’s the time?” he asks, voice low, hands on Akira’s ass digging fingers into his bruises.

Akira shudders in his arms, breathing a shaky exhale. “I’m sure we’ve still got some more time.”

Munehisa should check. Munehisa really should check, but Akira feels so good like this in his arms and Munehisa wants to feel him shudder like that again. “Maybe,” he breathes, massaging the flesh under his hands for the way that Akira squirms and shakes on top of him, “if we’re _quick_ …”

Akira curses, sinking his teeth into the flesh under his mouth like it’s some kind of pressure valve. Munehisa nudges the head of his cock against Akira’s hole and Akira pushes himself back down onto it with a groan. Sits up, sits back, until Munehisa bottoms out and Akira is rocking in his lap—

_I could just eat you up_

—nails digging into his chest.

Akira smiles down at him with his trickster smile, thighs flexing as he lifts up on Munehisa’s cock. “We should probably get started then.”

“So you know everything.”

They’re under the girder bridge, pitch black if not for the ceiling lights and the streetlamps at either end. It casts Tsuda’s face in sickly shadow, smile completely out of place on his face; Munehisa doesn’t allow himself to relax, not yet.

They’d agreed beforehand that Akira wouldn’t say anything, so he stands still and silent behind Munehisa, only his hand on Munehisa’s back, hidden by their bodies, and the soft puffs of his breath assure Munehisa that he’s there. Introduced as a witness and nothing more, since whatever happens, Tsuda doesn’t need any more ammunition to hurt him with, but there’s no hiding his age. Not for the first time, Munehisa wishes that Tsuda wasn’t asshole enough to wear sunglasses at night; he can’t read him worth a damn like this.

“I’d be glad to keep my mouth shut about your failed deal if you stay away from my family,” he says.

Tsuda snorts. “So you're still sticking to the code, even in retirement.”

Munehisa scowls, because the code was the best part about being Yakuza. They weren’t just beasts fighting over scraps, just people sticking to their own rules and laws. It’s what made them different to some scum off the streets.

“It’s there for a reason, Tsuda, we’re not fucking animals.”

“Well,” Tsuda says, tilting his head, “glad to see you haven't lost your touch in your absence. I bet we never would've gotten duped by those Hong Kong motherfuckers if I still had you as my right-hand man. Instead I'm stuck dealing with the mess that idiot Masa made for me. Hey, kid,” he continues, looking over Munehisa’s shoulder, “sorry for getting a respectable teen like yourself wrapped up in our bullshit feud.”

There’s a quiet snort by his ear and Munehisa doesn’t need to look back to know that Akira is smiling, loving the idea of anyone finding him respectable.

“I hope dealing with all this Yakuza business hasn't been too much trouble,” Tsuda says, and Munehisa feels his temper ignite.

“Enough,” he says, because he knows what Tsuda is doing, picking away at Akira, trying to drive a wedge between them. And it’s not like he’s worried about it actually happening — it’s not like the Yakuza thing is _news_ to Akira, not anymore — but it’s fucking insulting listening to him try. “This whole thing has been a pain in my ass but it's over. You're finished.”

Tsuda finally lets his smile drop, sighs, and then pulls a gun on them. “You're not the one who gets to make the decisions around here.”

Munehisa freezes, heart suddenly pounding in his chest. Above them, the lights dim and flicker for a long moment, and without thinking Munehisa holds out an arm to stop Akira from doing anything stupid as nails suddenly dig into his back. Behind his eyes, a dull pressure builds.

“The fuck are you doing, Tsuda?”

“I’m done playing nice with you,” Tsuda spits. “You're gonna make me what I need one way or another, Mune, and if you can't do it fast, both your son and this little witness of yours are gonna pay for it.”

“What the _hell_ is wrong with you?” he yells. He’s scared, he realises, terrified out of his goddamn mind. He’d thought last time was bad, but he’s played his hand and all he’s got to show for it is a gun pointed at his— at Akira. His eyes ache with the pain in his head but Munehisa barely dares to blink, eyes fixed on Tsuda.

“Times have changed, Mune,” Tsuda says, tone slow like he’s explaining something to an idiot. It’s patronising as shit, but Munehisa supposes that you can do whatever the hell you want when you’ve got a gun pointed at someone. Overhead, the lights in the tunnel flicker again. “Nobody gives a fuck about your goddamn code of honour anymore. So listen to me, you little piece of shit. You're going to make me those guns and you're going to do it fast. Don't make me tell you again.”

Finished, Tsuda turns and walks away, throwing a smug, condescending wave over his shoulder before he disappears around the corner.

Munehisa’s temples _throb_. There’s a loud buzz as he pushes the heel of his hand into his forehead, and then the pain spikes and one after another there’s a pop as each light in the tunnel finally gives out.

What did— why does his head—

“Fuck,” Munehisa says, head pulsing, but with Akira at his back he doesn’t allow himself any more than that, pushing it away. He turns to him now, with the light from the streetlamp just enough to pierce the gloom of the tunnel, desperate to see him with his own two eyes. “Fuck, I’m such an idiot. You okay, Akira?”

The glint of light off his glasses shades his eyes, but there’s that animal tilt to his head as he stares off in the direction Tsuda went. A chill works its way down his spine and Munehisa reaches for him.

“Akira?” he says, and he can almost feel the moment that Akira’s attention focuses back on him.

“I’m okay, Munehisa.” Akira says, and he smiles — in reassurance, he supposes — but it’s not like his normal ones. Not even close. “I had you with me after all. I didn’t like the way he spoke to you,” he adds, almost idly, and Munehisa snorts.

“You and me both, kid,” he says, but the levity is short-lived. “Fuck,” he says again, trying to breathe through the feeling of a noose slowly tightening around his neck. “Fuck.”

His head throbs, and on his chest sits the weight of every single one of his failures. Munehisa gives one, long exhale and then says, “Come on, let’s go home.”

That night Munehisa dreams.

They’re in the yakiniku restaurant again, just him and Akira. Between them the grill sits cold, and blood pools in the centre of the plate of meat that Akira eats from. The meat looks strange, he can’t help but think, watching as blood dribbles down onto Akira’s bottom lip before his tongue licks it away. The skin is still on it, and Munehisa can see flashes of colour on it: lines of foamy white and sea blue, dots of red and orange. It looks familiar, he can’t help but think, like—

“You’re not eating, Munehisa.”

Munehisa looks down at his own plate, at his own slices of meat sitting in a pool of blood, and obediently lifts a piece with his chopstick. There are black scales inked into the skin of this piece. Munehisa opens his mouth and—

Wakes up.

Exhaustion hangs like a weight from around his neck, and it’s only the familiarity of the route that spurs him on, one foot in front of the other. Munehisa blinks, and he’s submerged in the dark tunnel again, Tsuda at the end with a gun pointed at his head. Akira clings to his arm but when he looks there’s no one there, and Munehisa breathes in the icy air, hoping to clear his head.

It feels like he’s still dreaming.

The walk to work exists like one extended moment this morning, tired eyes seeing the world blurred to vagueness. The lights overhead are just smears of colour, casting long shadows across the silent streets and Munehisa stares at them, waiting for… something.

He’s in way over his head.

He thinks about going to the clan anyway, about sinking to his knees and begging for salvation, for sanctuary, for a gun and the satisfaction of emptying a clip into Tsuda smug face, but all he sees is Kaoru's broken body lying in the streets. He shakes his head. 

The pitch black morning wraps tight around him like a blanket. The blank silhouettes of people surround him as he stumbles onto central street and carry him on down towards the scramble, but all Munehisa hears is the regular thud of his heart in his ears.

Maybe he was always going to end up back here. Punishment for ever thinking someone like him ever deserved a clean slate. Maybe the trajectory of his life was decided the moment his shitty mother gave birth to an equally shitty child.

Munehisa huffs a tired laugh. Maybe he should stop being so pathetic. 

He’d already decided, back when he held Kaoru for the first time. Whatever it takes. He’d do whatever it took for this kid to not end up like him. So he guesses that’s his answer right there. Make the weapons. Deal with any shit later.

The mouth of the alleyway leading to his shop looms in front of him, like an entrance to another place. Munehisa drifts towards it, feet dragging behind him, and yawns as he slips away from the current of people flowing down the street.

There’s… something lying on the ground in the middle of the alley. Something pale and pink, an amorphous lump piled up in the middle of the street. Munehisa takes measured steps towards it, breath pluming in the air in front of him, and tilts his head as understanding drips in. It kind of looks like— well, it kind of looks like a body, if a body was nothing more than a gelatinous pile of flesh: two legs bent at odd angles, a mass of muscles and sinew and congealed blood for a torso, and a face — a familiar face, a face he grew up with, a face he knows by heart — frozen in a rictus of horror.

Well, Munehisa thinks, suddenly wide awake as he reaches for his phone, that’s one problem solved.

It took a day for the police to be finished enough to let him back into his shop, and another for him to tell the media snooping around to fuck off, but by the third day the story has broken and Munehisa gets to read about how Tsuda was skinned alive and dumped on his doorstep over his morning coffee. He tells Akira not to come in until the whole thing has blown over but Sunday morning sees Akira leaning up against the wall outside the shop wrapped up in his gloves and scarf, waiting to be let in. 

Stepping into the shop with him is surreal, like it’s just another day, time outside of reality, and Munehisa supposes that it is. Tsuda clearly got involved with something or some _one_ he shouldn’t have, and that’s very much not his problem, but the whole situation nags at him.

If he didn’t know better he’d think someone was trying to send him a message.

Munehisa pulls off his coat settles in his office while Akira heads out to presumably finish restocking, and then, after a moment of hesitation, pulls out his phone and looks up the murders again. He doesn’t quite know what he’s looking for, but it’s like when you have a specific word in mind but it just won’t come; no matter how many alternatives people offer you, you can’t rest until you’ve found the right one.

Kaneshiro was another victim he knew, even if only vaguely, but none of the others. Except… there’s a picture in the story about the artist, and that kid looks an awful lot like Kitagawa, and in the story about the teacher, it says he was—

“Hey, Akira. Where did you say you went to school again?”

(There’s—)

(There’s something not quite—)

“Shujin,” he says, the voice floating back into the office, “why?”

But Munehisa doesn’t answer. It doesn’t make sense, but only in the way that things are starting to make perfect sense. Horror, thick and choking, mounts in his chest as pieces start rapidly clicking together and he—

“Munehisa,” he hears, directly in his ear, and he startles, phone clattering to the table as he jerks in his chair.

It’s Akira standing there right beside him, head tilted in that way of his, but that knowledge doesn’t slow the rapid beating of his heart. Pain spikes in his head as Munehisa looks at him and sees the way his eyes slit like an animals behind his glasses, and the way his trickster smile bleeds across his face, a bloody wound that keeps growing, a mouth that splits open to reveal rows and rows of needle sharp teeth. And behind him, the air roils and bursts, bubbling into one, two, three four five sixseveneightnin—

Munehisa blinks hard, head pounding away behind his eyes, and when he looks again it’s just Akira standing there.

“Is everything okay?” Akira asks, peering down at him.

Munehisa hesitates for a long moment, searching, but then his shoulders come down as he relaxes. “Yeah,” he says, smiling, reaching for him. “Everything’s fine.”


End file.
